‘Both Sides Now’ brings the music of Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen to Pittsburgh
We’re not simply covering songs. We’re interpreting them without straying too far from what really reaches people."
Some friendships seem fated.
Take Rabbi Robbie Schaefer and Danielle Wertz.
The pair grew up in the same part of Northern Virginia, went to the same middle school and high school, and even entered the same profession: singing. They simply did it nearly 20 years apart.
And while they didn’t know each other growing up, the two have forged bonds performing as another pair of famous friends: Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell.
Mitchell met Cohen in 1967 while performing at the Newport Folk Festival, forming a relationship that influenced each other’s personal lives and music.
For Schaefer and Wertz, their friendship began when the rabbi — who came to the rabbinate late in life after pursuing a career in music — was asked by the Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia, to create a show based on Cohen and Mitchell’s relationship.
Schaefer was working on finding someone to play Mitchell when the musical director of the show, Mark Meadows, suggested Wertz, who had been developing a career in the jazz world and was working in New York City.
“He sent me a couple of videos of her singing,” Schaefer remembered, “one of which was her doing a jazz version of the Jewish prayer R’tzei, and I was done after that.”
Schaefer was a singer with the folk rock band Eddie from Ohio for nearly 30 years and working in musical theater. He even wrote a musical about his relationship with his father, a Holocaust survivor, that was originally produced at Signature Theatre in 2018.
Wertz is an award-winning vocalist, composer and arranger, whose latest album, “Silent Course,” won a 2026 Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition.
In 2022, the pair were commissioned to co-create and co-star in “Both Sides Now: The Music and Lives of Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen,” which is coming to the Oaks Theater in Oakmont on Nov. 12.
Schaefer describes the show as a “scripted concert.”
“It’s a story concert that’s relying on the catalogs of Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell,” he explained. “There’s a whole narrative that happens during the show about their lives — inserted in there are our lives. Ultimately, we hope, it weaves together the lives of the audience that see themselves in the show, as well.”
The two discovered many of the songs, he said, while sitting in a room putting the show together.
The differs from cabaret shows as well as biographical musicals, Wertz said.
“Robbie and I decided we didn’t want the show to start, ‘Joni Mitchell was born Roberta Joan Anderson,’ because that’s not our thing and that’s not going to feel emotional, especially at the time in 2022,” she said.
In fact, the musical was the first many saw after the COVID lockdown. As a result, she said, the “tenderness” and “intimacy” of the show resonated with the audience.
“Both Sides Now” was an immediate hit when it premiered in 2022. Signature Theatre asked the pair to stage it again in 2023. It was because of that success that the pair decided to take the show on the road.
“I said, ‘I guess we have something magical here,’” Wertz recalled. “So we started booking a tour following that in the summer of 2024.”
Tribute shows seem to be having their time in the sun. Numerous bands are making a healthy living playing music made famous by other bands. Broadway musicals, like “Beautiful: The Carole King Musical,” have captured the interest of the ticket-buying public, and Las Vegas residencies feature hitmakers of the previous five decades. And yet, Schaefer is clear: This isn’t your typic nostalgia show.
“We’re not going on stage and inhabiting these people,” he explained. “We’re not playing roles. We are ourselves. And we’re not simply covering songs, we’re interpreting them without straying too far from what really reaches people. I think there’s something deeply vulnerable and honest about the show we’ve created.”
It’s also a show that has plenty for Jewish attendees to like.
“The emotional centerpiece of the show comes at the center of the show,” Schaefer said.
The rabbi said the moment features Wertz’s R’tzei mashed up with Cohen’s “Who By Fire.”
“I feel the show, up to that point, is preparing us for that moment,” he said. “It’s something a little bit deeper, a little bit more intimate, a little bit more spiritual. It’s really profound for me every night.”
Wertz agrees. She noted that some people who come to the show are Mitchell fans, others are Cohen fans. And while you learn about both their lives, she said there is an emotional narrative ride that culminates in that moment.
“I think it has the potential to be this deep moment, and it’s really special to feel that in the room,” she said.
“Both Sides Now: The Music and Lives of Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen,” comes to the Oaks Theater in Oakmont on Nov. 12 at 7 p.m. Tickets can be purchased online. PJC
David Rullo can be reached at drullo@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.
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